GFSI, ERP Integration Helps Ensure Food Safety Compliance

With integrated ERP software, food companies can safeguard their manufacturing processes by establishing and applying a variety of security and approval levels at critical quality checkpoints. For example, GFSI has requirements to ensure employee competency. These can easily be maintained by placing security levels within the ERP system, and preventing staff from working at stations where they aren’t qualified to be.

A real-time processing-inspection tool also prevents the ability to skip steps in production by validating the correct completion of each step in its assigned order. In addition, recipe and raw material approval checks can prevent unauthorized substitutions during the manufacturing process. If a particular ingredient is unavailable and a substitution is required, the system will then verify the authenticity and pre-approval of all ingredient changes.

The security benefits of integration extend outside of the company as well. Real-time alerts can notify the quality assurance team whenever a product is received from an unauthorized vendor, and allow for immediate intervention and correction.

Minimize Potential Recall Risks—and Costs

The number of food recalls continues to rise in the U.S., and the costs of foodborne illnesses are increasing at a skyrocketing pace. According to a 2015 study by Robert Scharf, associate professor at The Ohio State University, the total cost of foodborne illness could now be as high as $93.3 billion, up from an estimated $77.7 billion in 2012.

But if a recall actually does occur, one of the most important benefits of GFSI and ERP integration is its ability to minimize a food company’s costs. The same is true during a food safety audit. With real-time ERP integration, food companies of any size are more able to contain costs in a crisis situation.

Figure 1 shows the relationship between a food company’s core manufacturing functions and its standard accounting processes. Everything that happens on the shop floor—from receiving to production to shipping—has a corresponding impact in the accounting system; in other words, not at the plant, but at the corporate level.

A food recall requires seamless traceability throughout the entire enterprise, not just the manufacturing operation. Unless a food company can show exactly where everything is at a given point in time, it’s virtually impossible to identify and isolate where the problems lie, both within and outside of the enterprise.

For example, how do you pinpoint where a particular item of inventory is in its production cycle? Is it still in receiving? Is it already in the production process? Is it now part of a finished product? Has it been shipped? And if so, where did it go?

Any discrepancy or even a short-term lag between manufacturing and accounting makes it virtually impossible to ensure accurate traceability. The only solution is to integrate safety processes into a fully integrated real-time system.

Figure 2 shows what an integrated ERP-based safety system should include.

An integrated ERP program should have two key elements to satisfy GFSI compliance.

1. A complete batch history that records all ingredients used, including where they came from and when they were added to the production process. It should also record all inspection information, including who did the work. (This type of report can be used by the FDA as well as third-party auditors.)
2. Cradle to grave real-time traceability, one forward and one backward, as required by the FDA and USDA.

With the ability for real-time data capture, all processes that are done on the floor should be recorded on the floor. Raw material (RM) lot numbers should be captured and recorded when delivered. Additional inspections should also be made with corrective actions taken at each appropriate stage in the production process.